Monday, September 28, 2009

The Middle of the Road

When Jim Hightower says, "There's Nothing in the Middle of the Road but Yellow Stripes and Dead Armadillos," he's talking about centrism in American politics, but I'm instantly reminded of the real-life streets down which we all travel. Armadillos are rare in San Francisco, of course, but yellow stripes are also missing from far too many of our streets.

The city of Minneapolis is about to return two of its downtown streets to two-way traffic after nearly 30 years of one-way flow. Those streets, like many in downtowns across the country, were converted to one-way couplets by auto-centric traffic engineers in the middle of the last century.

Their goal was to squeeze more cars through older, narrow streets as fast as they could. And that's exactly what happened. The problem is that the fast, thick traffic along these one-way streets has proven to be dangerous to vulnerable road users, especially pedestrians, and has often pushed away much of the street life.

Two-way streets are naturally calmer because cars approaching from opposite directions make each other nervous. Nervous drivers are slower and more alert to their surroundings. Two way streets are also easier for bicycles to navigate, and the presence of bikes on a street further calms car traffic.

There is, in my opinion, no reason not to begin restoring two way traffic on San Francisco streets, starting with the most dangerous first. The lives of our neighbors are too high a cost to justify a slightly faster car commute.

"There is, in my opinion, no reason not to begin restoring two way traffic on San Francisco streets, starting with the most dangerous first. The lives of our neighbors are too high a cost to justify a slightly faster car commute."

There is of course a good reason to not restore two-way streets in San Francisco: it's a small city with a lot of traffic, and the one-way streets are essential to managing that traffic. The woman killed near the Panhandle evidently ran out from behind a parked car and was hit by a car she didn't see. The idea that we should redesign city streets to protect jaywalkers is ridiculous.http://district5diary.blogspot.com/2009/09/another-dumb-idea-from-mirkarimi.html

Rob-It is a small city with a lot of traffic. It always will be. We could double the width of every street, make all of them one ways, and triple the lanes in every highway. In five years, rush hour delays will be just as bad and the parking situation far, far worse.

You cannot solve the problem of traffic by creating more lanes. I have seen your promise land: in some places there are 26 lane freeways. They come to gridlock just as they did when they were 10 lane freeways.

You don't have a solution, you have a petulant grudge. Don't let it allow you to opine as an expert on the death of a pedestrian when you are in no damn position to do so.

I grew up in a west-coast suburb and often see huge 4–7-lane arterial roads and wish they could be split up into a pair of smaller couplets that might at least be conducive to some form of development other than big-box stores and car dealerships. In my neck of the woods, this was the progressive thing to do. Of the streets in downtown Portland that are unsafe to bike on—Burnside, Naito Parkway, wait…those are the only two two-ways in all of downtown Portland—every last one of them is a two-way street (in contrast to rest of the downtown street grid, 98% of which is made up of ONE-WAY streets). In fact, last I heard, there were proposals to convert Burnside from a monstrous two-way to a manageable couplet on both sides of the Willamette River (to catalyze urban renewal on one side, and to make space for streetcar tracks on the other side).

I think you’re calling for the execution of an innocent man. I’ll take a couplet over a super-sized two-way arterial any day. The important thing is how you time your lights. Portland’s lights are timed for 12–15 mph throughout downtown. That’s how you bring speeds down!

*NOTE: In some cases, two-ways were converted to one-ways in anticipation of massive traffic volumes that never materialized and/or to make room for angled parking (I’m thinking of Vancouver, WA right now). In such cases, by all means, make the two-way conversion. However, something tells me the problem in downtown SF isn’t the ghost town effect…

I wonder if you can provide some examples of the different types of streets you talk about. It's hard for me to imagine an arterial street being split into couplets like you describe without some pretty drastic eminent domain battles, but maybe I misunderstand.

The streets I'm talking about are usually four lanes of traffic in one direction, with the next street over being four lanes in the other direction.

This configuration may be better than having an 8-lane freeway and a double-length block, but it's less ideal than having two two-way streets with two lanes of traffic in each direction.

Turns and conflicts with oncoming traffic help slow down cars traveling on such roads. That's good for pedestrians.

"We have a lot of traffic because we've carved out room for traffic, not because there's a good reason for it to be here."

Both Oak Street and Fell Street by the Panhandle have been one-way streets for a long as I can remember. They're both essential in handling East-West traffic in San Francisco. The notion that our city can somehow turn these one-way streets into two-way streets without causing massive gridlock is fanciful.

"You cannot solve the problem of traffic by creating more lanes."

Nobody in SF is proposing the creation of more traffic lanes. The only issue is how to use the lanes that we have.

"You don't have a solution, you have a petulant grudge. Don't let it allow you to opine as an expert on the death of a pedestrian when you are in no damn position to do so."

Not sure what you're referring to with the "petulant grudge" remark. The death of this woman is still under investigation, but the preliminary media stories suggested that she was jaywalking on a busy, one-way street, which is not a good survival strategy.

specifics on conversion of Burnside to couplet in PDX:An existing parallel street (Couch), which is currently hardly used on either side of the river, will carry traffic in one direction, while Burnside will carry traffic in the other direction. This will permit the narrowing of Burnside and the addition of on-street parking.

Additional comments on general subject:Although I certainly think you are barking up the wrong tree, I don't necessarily have anything against two-ways. Downtown Vancouver, BC (I'm told) is made up almost entirely of 4-lane two-ways with no turn lanes. Vancouver, BC is the gold standard of good planning in my book, so I can't argue with that.

"Both Oak Street and Fell Street by the Panhandle have been one-way streets for a long as I can remember. ... The notion that our city can somehow turn these one-way streets into two-way streets without causing massive gridlock is fanciful."

For a moment I imagined a San Francisco that had not yet been graced by your presence, Mr. Anderson. Thank you for that moment.

I'm afraid you'll have to explain why two way streets would cause gridlock. There would be the same number of lanes in either direction.

True, traffic might go slower (like, the speed limit) but that's exactly the point! In addition to the benefits that brings to vulnerable road users, it also means more cars can fit on those roads - it increases their capacity.

And please do not drag the poor victim of reckless driving through the mud any further. Preliminary media reports are not a good basis for judgment and, in fact, subsequent coverage indicates that she was not breaking the law.

The only person who was clearly described as breaking the law was the 19-year-old driver, who was in violation of Section 21951 of the California Vehicle Code. A violation for which he was not cited, let alone killed.

I think what it boils down to is that the current level of congestion of Burnside has serious consequences beyond just inconveniencing drivers. It screws up the bus schedule, it makes for a dangerous situation for bicyclists, and it makes it impossible to safely turn onto the side streets, making the area unattractive to businesses.

I don't know San Fransisco very well. It's possible that Vancouver, BC-style 4-lane two-ways could have their merits…or they could be more trouble than they're worth.

If I were you, I would focus on pushing for better signal timing and more curb extensions, and take a trip up the coast.

(sorry for the multiple versions of this comment; I kept finding typos and other mistakes).

One-way streets are actually better for both cyclists and pedestrians, all else being equal. You stand a bigger chance of being killed by a motorist trying to do a sudden left turn through a small gap in oncoming traffic than you do by anything that could happen on a one-way street, all else being equal.

I'd rather not be hit by a car going 40 than be hit by a car going 20 - the speed is irrelevant if the collision doesn't happen.

While I suppose I can conceive of a calm, safe one-way street that benefits from the aspects of one-way flow that you describe, I argue that reality doesn't tend to match that vision, and the one-way streets we have here in SF are certainly not safer than nearby two-way streets.

I also think it's not quite fair to say 'the speed is irrelevant if the collision doesn't happen,' because collisions always happen.

Even if the number of accidents goes up, I'd say a street is less dangerous if car traffic is slower because the severity of the accidents is so much lower with even a small reduction in speed.